No akkor ez nem lesz klubközi :-)

Hogy egy kis házifeladatot is csináljak, Italo Santelli-t nem nagyon találtam meg magyar honlapokon. Itt van valami, ami érdekes:

"The Germans developed a system of sabre play known as the dusack. However, the development of modern sabre plays with a light, narrow-bladed weapon, is traced to the 19th century Milanese fencing master Guiseppe Radaelli of the northern Italian school. Being a teacher of mounted troops, he was concerned exclusively with the military use of the sabre. So he sought to develop a sabre technique in which the cut played a principal role and which would result in precise, rapid and damaging actions. The fundamental principle of his sabre technique is that the arm should be held in a firm and balanced manner, with principal movement effected by the forearm so that cuts and parries can be dextrous and rapid, and the cutting edge properly directed.

Luigi Barbasetti, a follower of Radaelli, left Italy in 1894 to establish his own fencing academy, the Austro-Hungarian Central Fencing School, in Vienna. He was later appointed fencing master of the Austro-Hungarian Military School at Wiener-Neustadt. In 1896, Italo Santelli, a pupil of Carlo Pessina who was also a Radaellian, was invited to teach in Budapest. With Barbasetti in Austria and Santelli in Hungary, the Italian influence became paramount in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Hungarian school improved on the Italian school by using finger play to control hits and blade movements, thus allowing a flexible wrist and a minimum of arm movements. This proved more effective than the Italian school in world competitions for over half a century."

De itt az igazi anyag, en guarde, messieurs...

Hungarian Dueling in the Twentieth Century
by Charles Conwell
Saber duels were common in Hungary in the decades preceding World War II. Maestro Tlaios Csiszar, the 85-year-old retired fencing coach from the University of Pennsylvania, remembered at least one a week. Csiszar was a protégé of Italo Santelli and an assistant coach in Italo's Budapest salle. I had heard one of the maestro's dueling stories second-hand from my fencing instructor, James Munray, Csiszar's provost. When I visited the annual Csiszar fencing tournament in Philadelphia, I was surprised to find the maestro sitting alone during a lull between bouts. I introduced myself and expressed my interest in Hungarian dueling.
Before I could ask for an interview, he began an enthusiastic 20-minute description of Hungarian dueling. He said he had personally trained men for over 100 duels in Budapest.

Duels were fought over women, politics, and a variety of social offenses. The maestro remembered one duel fought between two members of a party-line telephone. In another duel, the parties involved walked into the salle and began talking to one another, a breach of dueling etiquette. Their seconds asked them to end their conversation as they were about to fight each other. Somehow the duel had been arranged without them realizing exactly who they were going to fight.

Once cards were exchanged, the seconds arranged the terms of the duel. It could be ended at first blood or fought until one of the two doctors present ended the duel because of exhaustion, blood loss, or high blood pressure. The maestro called one duel that included over twenty wounds. Another duel was fought between two extremely cautious elderly gentle men. One backed the other into a corner but didn't attack. After a long pause the director asked if either gentlemen required a medical examination. Eagerly, they both said, "Yes."

Before each duel began the director warned the duelists that dueling was illegal and asked them if they wanted to proceed. They invariably did. Sometimes a coward would inform the police of the time and place of an impending duel. The police would arrive and send everyone home, much to the coward's relief.

The duels were fought in the salle at nine o'clock after regular fencing hours. Each duelist was accompanied by a second and a doctor. The duelists stripped to the waist and wore bandages on their wrist, armpit, and neck. An unpadded glove was also worn. Their hair was heavily slicked, parted in the middle, and combed directly to either side to deflect or minimize head cuts. The centimeter-wide blades were sharpened along the entire true edge and on the first third of the false edge. The blades were cleaned with alcohol to prevent infection.

The maestro described one duel that was being fought inconclusively with dull sabers. The director of the duel told the maestro to get sharper weapons. He did. Still no blood. The director told the maestro to get the sharpest weapons because he "didn't want to be there all night." He complied and the duel was quickly ended.

According to the maestro, thrusting was forbidden. The maestro remembered only one death. A sabrer inadvertently impaled himself on his opponent's point. The wounded duelist was rushed to the hospital where he died of internal bleeding. The survivor was given a sentence of one year in a minimum security prison.

The maestro trained duelists to concentrate on defense. He taught what he called a "high prime" guard. He demonstrated what I would call a 'Hanging or yielding fifth." It protected the head, face, and left chest. Cuts to the head and face were favored. The maestro taught his students to cut quickly to the face and return to high guard in one movement. When I asked if any duelist cut to the sword hand or arm to bring a quick and relatively merciful end to the duel, the maestro replied, "We thought it boring to go for the sword hand."

James Murray told me one of the maestro's stories in which an ear was completely cut off in a duel. The doctor was prepared to sew it on but the ear could not be found. The next day the maestro, then a junior member of the staff, was cleaning lockers at one end of the salle. He lifted a mask off the top of one of the lockers and found the shriveled ear inside. The maestro himself remembered another duel in which an ear was almost cut off. The doctor sewed it back on without anesthetic in the salle.

The maestro once trained both adversaries in a duel. Someone had challenged one of maestro's students to a duel and asked the maestro for training. The maestro refused as this was a breach of dueling etiquette. The next time the maestro saw his student, the maestro knew, he replied that his opponent had asked for lessons. The student told the maestro to train his adversary.

The maestro, like most of the best fencers, did not duel. The duel Giorgio Santelli fought to defend his father's honor was an exception. Having a reputation as an expert fencer discouraged challenges. If challenged, the maestro would refuse. "It would have been unfair to take advantage of our skill."

Listening to maestro Csiszar relate his dueling experience was an exciting moment in living history. I am grateful to him for his time and feel privileged to record his experience.

ON